Netflix’s documentary re-examining the legacy of America’s Next Top Model is drawing early criticism from one famous former contestant: Adrianne Curry.
The upcoming three-part series — Reality Check: Inside America’s Next Top Model — features the show’s former producers and judges, including Tyra Banks, re-examining the long-running reality hit and reflecting on the show’s many controversies.
But Curry, who won the show’s debut season in 2003, posted on social media that she declined to take part in the documentary and finds judging the show by current standards “absurd.”
“I think people psychoanalyzing it over 20 years later with a woke lens is absurd,” she wrote.
Curry also said she refused to participate in the documentary, though for different reasons.
“I don’t trust people to not manipulate things I say for TV so I decline everything,” Curry wrote. “Also, the public is cult-like and cruel, so the last thing I want is a bunch of eyeballs on me … I have [zero] trust in any producers, no desire to be really public in this day and age … and am hard retired from Hollywood.”
Curry also replied to a fan who wrote, “It’s crazy that [photo shoot director Jay Manuel and runway coach J. Alexander] are acting like they can NOT believe the things Tyra was doing, but they were involved just the same,” and Curry replied, “It’s a cover up fest. Let ’em weave their webs.”
In the trailer for Reality Check, Banks says, “I knew I went too far … it was very intense, but you guys were demanding it.” Fellow host Nigel Barker says, “It was wrong and for some reason no one seemed to see it … we felt betrayed.” And Manuel says, “I realized Tyra would do anything for the success of her show.”
The show had a history of models saying consent wasn’t given during certain physical interactions with male models and repeated instances of fat shaming.
The project is from EverWonder Studio, Wise Child Studios and directors Mor Loushy and Daniel Sivan (American Manhunt: Osama Bin Laden).
Reality Check drops on Netflix on Feb. 16.
